he murder of Meredith Kercher occurred in Perugia, Italy, on 1 November 2007. Kercher, aged 21 at the time of her death, was a British university exchange student from Coulsdon, South London. She shared an upstairs flat with three other young women. She was sexually assaulted and stabbed, and property belonging to her was stolen.
Rudy Guede, a resident of Perugia, was convicted on 28 October 2008 of the sexual assault and murder of Kercher. His fast-track conviction was upheld, and he is now serving a reduced sentence of 16 years. Raffaele Sollecito, an Italian student, and Amanda Knox, an American student and a flatmate of Kercher, were convicted of sexual assault and murder in a separate trial on 4 December 2009. They were given sentences of 25 and 26 years respectively. Knox and Sollecito have appealed. Their trial de novo commenced in December 2010 and is scheduled to end in late 2011.
The case has received much media attention in Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States. It has been widely described as controversial, with questions raised over the validity of the convictions, coverage in the news media and the conduct of the police investigation and prosecution.
* 1 Meredith Kercher
* 2 People charged with the murder
o 2.1 Rudy Guede
o 2.2 Amanda Knox
o 2.3 Raffaele Sollecito
* 3 Events surrounding the murder
o 3.1 Upstairs flat
o 3.2 Police interviews
o 3.3 Guede's arrest
* 4 Evidence
o 4.1 Forensic evidence
o 4.2 Prosecution and defence arguments
* 5 Guede trial and appeals
o 5.1 Trial
o 5.2 Appeals
* 6 Knox and Sollecito trial and appeals
o 6.1 Arrest
o 6.2 Committal hearings
o 6.3 Trial
o 6.4 Judges' report
o 6.5 Appeals
* 7 Media coverage
* 8 Reaction of the Kercher family
* 9 Support for Knox and Sollecito
o 9.1 Senator Maria Cantwell
o 9.2 Innocence Project
o 9.3 Petition to Italian Justice Minister
* 10 Other related court cases
* 11 Portrayals in books and other media
o 11.1 Books
o 11.2 Television documentaries
o 11.3 Television film
* 12 Notes
* 13 References
* 14 External links
Meredith Susanna Cara Kercher, known to her friends as "Mez", was born on 28 December 1985[notes 1] in Southwark, London, England, and lived in Coulsdon, South London. She had two older brothers and an older sisterHer father is a freelance journalist and her mother is a housewife who was born in India.
Kercher attended the Old Palace School in Croydon then she took a degree in European Studies at the University of Leeds. At the time of her murder, she was studying for one year at the University of Perugia as part of the ERASMUS student exchange programme.
In Perugia, she shared a flat with Amanda Knox and two Italian women. Her body was found in her bedroom on the afternoon of 2 November 2007 by police and flatmates. Two mobile phones, two credit cards and 300 euros in cash had been stolen at the time of the murder. Her funeral was held on 14 December at Croydon Parish Church, with more than 300 people in attendance. She was awarded a posthumous degree by the University of Leeds
People charged with the murder
Rudy Guede
Rudy Hermann Guede (born 26 December 1986, Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoirewas 20 at the time of the murder. He had come to Perugia at the age of five with his father who worked as a labourer in the 1990s. At the age of 16, when his father left Italy, Guede was informally adopted by the family of a local businessman Guede had acquired joint Italian nationality and sporadically studied accounting and hotelkeeping He also played basketball for the Perugia youth team in the 2004–2005 seasonHe often stayed with his aunt who lived in Lecco, about 50 km north of Milan, and sometimes worked in Milan bars, returning occasionally to Perugia Nick Squires of The Daily Telegraph states, "He became a suspect in the murder two weeks after Miss Kercher's body was found, when DNA tests on a bloody fingerprint and on samples taken from the body were found to match samples which police already had on file following his earlier arrests.
Amanda Knox
Amanda Marie Knox (born 9 July 1987, Seattle, Washington) was a 20-year-old University of Washington language student who shared a flat with Kercher She was in Perugia attending the University for Foreigners for one year, studying Italian, German and creative writing Knox met her boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito at a classical music concert held on 25 October 200 which she attended with Kercher at the University for Foreigners. When Kercher left at the intermission, Sollecito met Knox.
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